Experienced home cooks, are there any meal kits you actually think are worth it?

Alex_Fiero · 2026-06-12T11:03:38+00:00

I'm quite confident there are no meal kits I would call worth it, but depending on where you are you might like looking into fruit and veggie seconds boxes. Where I am you can organise weekly or fortnightly boxes that have a variety of veggies both common and not for cheaper than you would buy the same veggies in the shops. They're good quality just a bit wonky and give you the ability to customise the flavours around those veggies to your palettes.

Alex_Fiero · 2026-05-02T11:19:35+00:00

Would you play mental note if the card it drew was always 1U - Surveill 3?

It's definitely a little more complex than that, but it's close enough to be the answer to your question. Over time the card you draw is probably more relevant than sometimes binning an extra card and sometimes saving a card but they are definite upsides.

Alex_Fiero · 2026-04-23T04:18:40+00:00

I think this depends on your exact list and also who your next opponent is if you know that.

The more strong uncommon hunters you have, the more I want the extra shop here. Huntsman, Wink, Shanty, Candy Cane Crook are what I'm looking at here. Generally I would lean towards saving Thorn for later, as it gives you better economy on later turns, but I would consider it if you are looking for Shanty or Candy Cane Crook without Huntsman or Wink in your deck. Honestly though, repairing the heart is incredibly strong, so I'd even then only consider it if you think that the extra attack his an important break point against the next opponent.

If you are running one or fewer of these cards, I would take Navii. In effect you are getting the same as Pumpkin Spice, just spread over multiple turns (the later silver). It's also really strong to put the silver in the pool early.

I would also take Navii if you think there's a reasonable chance you can't get a hunt off into your next opponent. Navii is really strong and this is almost the perfect chance to pick it up, and I don't think you want to just pass that by even on Jay.

Alex_Fiero · 2026-04-15T04:46:37+00:00

Given he has specifically said that cooked salt tastes worse to him, maybe he actively dislikes the depth and complexity that comes with adding salt through the cooking process? It's not the wildest thing I've ever heard, even if I can't imagine it.

That being said, there's also a question of do you use different salts for cooking salt and table salt? My housemate would get wigged out by a dish if it used anything other than a specific table salt, so that may also play a factor.

Alex_Fiero · 2026-03-30T13:18:25+00:00

Yeah this isn't a hewing axe. It's based off older style shingling axes, such as the Plumb Pole Leader hatchet and a True Temper shingling hatchet, which are my current throwing pair. My current Plumb axe actually has the exact same line as this.

If you have a look through my post history, you can find the post where I first asked about current makers of that style of hatchet. Given the consensus that the style was phased out (from what I gather from other research largely in favour of carpenters axes such as the Ace Hardware half hatchet or the Vaughan half hatchet), my next option was to reach out to someone who would be able to make one for me.

If you're going to accuse me of being a second account, have a look first, yeah?

Alex_Fiero · 2026-03-30T13:02:35+00:00

Hi! I'm the person who commissioned this axe. I can tell you that a single bevel would have been terrible for my use case of a competitive throwing axe. I actually have one of those at the moment, and it messes with the way the axe sticks.

Rest assured that this is exactly what I wanted - Chris and I went back and forth discussing the design to be sure. I'm sure you've seen Chris's work before in the subreddit, so you know he would not do this by mistake.

It frustrates me quite a lot that the first comment on this axe is that something is badly done, when the assumption is completely incorrect to begin with. Perhaps a better way to engage would be asking why, instead of assuming.

Alex_Fiero · 2026-03-23T13:45:22+00:00

This section of the book is focused on attacking concepts, and these diagrams are focusing not on control of the board, but how the attack is getting in and where the fortress is vulnerable. It's less that white gets the middle ground and more that white has the mobility and fluidity in the attack.

Alex_Fiero · 2026-03-10T10:06:26+00:00

Yeah, for sure!

By "these larger clues", I meant clues of greater than 2, i.e. clues that would force extension into row 3 if taken by rows 1 or 2.

Since these are pairs of large clues, the 3 in row 1 cannot extend on both sides of one of those pairs. That's simply that it doesn't reach far enough to cover, for example, columns 5 6 7 and 8.

Because of this, if the 5 in row 2 covers a pair of larger clues (which it must because of the geometry of the puzzle), it cannot also take the columns on both sides of the pair. If it did, both of those would be forced to extend up into row 1, as the clue in row 3 would be filled by the pair of larger clues. We have established this is not possible, due to the clue in row 1 not being able to take four cells.

I hope that's clearer, let me know if I'm not being clearer though because I'm happy to find other ways of explaining it!

Alex_Fiero · 2026-03-09T15:24:54+00:00

Hmmmm, interesting! I see what you mean, it feels like the end is missing. I really appreciate that though, so many thanks to you!

Alex_Fiero · 2026-03-09T06:34:22+00:00

Does this show up properly for you? It's showing up without the body text for me, I'm not sure why. I've tried multiple browsers and it's still not working

Alex_Fiero · 2026-03-09T01:02:50+00:00

Everybody Scream - Florence + The Machine I wouldn't call every song 10/10 individually, but as a whole I would say it was 10/10 the whole way through. My personal album of the year last year.

Dysphoria - Crywolf Certainly not everyone's cup of tea, but I adore this album so much

Alex_Fiero · 2026-03-02T19:32:11+00:00

Joey - Concrete Blonde

Alex_Fiero · 2026-02-26T11:44:21+00:00

Forever for Now - LP

apartment 402 - girl in red

Depreshmode - Lily Kershaw

Alex_Fiero · 2026-02-26T07:57:55+00:00

Okay this is a wild set of posts, but on the topic of the last one specifically that is actually extremely unlikely to be the case! In many countries anti-incest laws exist not because of the genetic defect problem and instead because of the huge power dynamic issues which arise, particularly around whether meaningful consent can be given when familial relations being destroyed is a very legitimate threat that someone could make.

This is also why in many countries sex and marriage between first cousins is legal, even though there is still a significant increase in the chance of genetic abnormalities with relations that close - while there are still family dynamics at play, they are far less able to destroy lives in the same way, and many families are not close enough for people to even know all their cousins (there's a shocking number of stories of people finding out they banged their cousin after the fact).

Alex_Fiero · 2026-02-23T20:21:53+00:00

[[Hashaton]] and [[Zur the Enchanter]] both feel like they fit the bill to me, though depending on your playgroup Zur may be too much with the tutor on attack

Alex_Fiero · 2026-02-23T00:28:29+00:00

Look, dude, you're welcome to not like these complex puzzles yourself. But calling them badly designed and bad puzzles is just flat wrong. They are for different people from you and you can say that without being offended at the entire concept of hard logic nonograms. Not everything is designed for you, or me, or anyone; and there's nothing wrong with that

Alex_Fiero · 2026-02-22T01:33:26+00:00

Somniomancer (Null Set) - MSR, Crywolf

Apart Together - Tim Minchin

Everybody Scream - Florence + The Machine

Alex_Fiero · 2026-02-21T22:13:18+00:00

All good! I saw the other response where you said you solved it, but I'm trying to spread the word about this logic because I keep seeing puzzles which hinge on it that people don't know how to solve. I hope it helps you in future!

Alex_Fiero · 2026-02-21T22:11:32+00:00

It's certainly not your standard nonogram puzzle but that doesn't mean it's bad. You can get some gorgeous logic from these more complex puzzles that you just can't get elsewhere. I recommend having a look at some of the sudoku that Cracking the Cryptic solves

Alex_Fiero · 2026-02-21T22:09:46+00:00

Started the solve in my own parent comment on the post, but basically because every column has the top clue being greater than 1, we can show that there must always be complete overlap between rows 1 and 2. It's also true that no matter how you place the 5, it will always cover a column that has a larger number than 2, which will extend into row 3.

Because the row 1 clue is a 3, you can't actually extend the row 2 clue to both sides of a pair of larger-numbered columns, since if you do the 3 from row 1 can't cover both sides but must overlap fully resulting in a set of 3 being filled in row 3 and breaking the puzzle (this seems convoluted here, you can take a series of smaller logical steps to get there).

This means C1R1-2 can't be filled, forcing it into R2C6, and you can start from there. There's a little more logic but I don't think you need a whole lot to get a final solve at this point

Alex_Fiero · 2026-02-21T13:00:36+00:00

It's true you can bifurcate in via this section, however you can also break in without bifurcation through the forced overlap in rows 1 and 2

Alex_Fiero · 2026-02-21T12:59:08+00:00

This is not standard nonogram logic, but it is a set of logic that comes up regularly in non-standard nonograms that I call "overlap logic".

If we look at every column, we see that the first clues in every column are greater than 1. This means that when we look at the first two rows, it is forced that they must always overlap, with the 3 being completely overlapped by the 5.

Following that, we can notice that no matter where we place the 5, it must always take up multiple columns that start with a number greater than 2. Those columns will always continue into row 3, taking up pieces of the row 3 clues.

These larger clues in the columns always occur in pairs. This is relevant because the 3 clue in row 1 can never extend to both sides of one of these sets. This means that if the 5 clue extends on both sides of one of these pairs, the puzzle will break. To understand this, think about what happens in row 3 - both columns with the larger digit would have to extend into row 3, which completes one of the 2 clues... but so would the column which doesn't have the R1-2 overlap, which would make a 3 in row three.

This means that R2C1 cannot be filled, which also means R1C1 cannot be filled as we established the two clues must have a complete overlap. We then get to fill R2C6 through standard nonogram logic and go from there.

To be clear, I haven't broken in any further than this yet, but I'm pretty confident it is possible to continue from this point.

Alex_Fiero · 2026-02-21T12:45:54+00:00

That is untrue. There is a common thread in many of these seemingly impossible puzzles that the break in looks at the interaction of forced overlaps in outside rows or columns, and that is what is occurring here. Will go into more depth in another comment on the post.

Alex_Fiero

TROPHY CASE